Top Five – A Top 5 Replay

Well, when the Outfield Nation goes silent on just about everything (including the last couple of Top 5 entries) it can only mean one of two things: 1) No one is reading this, but that is not the case according to the oral feedback that I have received from most of you and from the numbers that I see on the blog's statistics, OR 2) We are boring the heck out of you.

Since that appears to be the case, I am going to lob a softball up to you all right now. As many of you know, the infamous Top 5 list that we run with here at The Outfield has its roots in two places. The first is the excellent John Cusack flick High Fidelity where Cusack is constantly dropping his "Top 5" everything and even going so far as to name his record label "Top 5". But predating High Fidelity was a little sitcom that some of you just might have caught during its oh so short run on NBC's Thursday night lineup - "Friends". During the third season as the show really hit its stride, we were blessed with an episode where the gang all consider what five celebrities would be on their "freebie list"--people they can sleep with without anyone getting upset. Ross finally narrows his list down by eliminating Isabella Rossellini... then he bumps into her.

The dialogue from that episode is classic:

Chandler: Well, we have a deal where we each get to pick five different celebrities that we can sleep with, and the other one can't get mad.
Ross: Ah, the heart of every healthy relationship: Honesty, respect, and sex with celebrities.
Monica: So, Chandler... who's on your list?
Chandler: Uh, Kim Basinger, Cindy Crawford, Halle Berry, Yasmine Bleeth, and, ah, Jessica Rabbit.
Rachel: Now, you do realize that she's a cartoon... and way out of your league?
Chandler: I know, I know, I just always wondered if I could get her eyes to pop out of her head.

Rachel: Oh, I don't know. I guess... Chris O'Donnel, John F. Kennedy, Jr., Daniel Day Lewis, Sting, and Parker Stevenson.
Ross: Spiderman?
Rachel: Hardy Boy.
Chandler: Peter Parker.
Ross: Thank you.

Ross: And... Isabella Rossillini.
Chandler: Oho! Very hot, very sexy. But, uh, ya know, she's too international, ya know. She's never gonna be around.
Rachel: So?
Chandler: So, you gotta play the odds: Pick somebody who's gonna be in the country, like, all the time.
Rachel: Yeah, 'cause that's why you won't get Isabella Rossillini--geography.

Ross: Okay, I'm done with my choices. These are final.
Rachel: Well, it's about time.
Joey: Oo, very official.
Ross: Oh, yeah, well, ya know, Chandler printed it up on his computer.
Monica: And who laminated it?
Ross: That was me.
Rachel: Alright, let me see. Uma Thurman, Winona Ryder, Elizabeth Hurely, Michelle Pfieffer, and... Dorothy Hammill?
Ross: Hey, it's my list.
Rachel: Okay, honey, you do realize she only spins like that on ice.

Isabella: You know, it's ironic.
Ross: What?
Isabella: Because I have a list of five goofy coffee house guys and yesterday I just bumped you for that guy over there.

If I recall correctly, our very first "Top 5" email chain that went around our college circle was this very subject and we have revisited the topic once or twice in the last decade. So, in an effort to stir up some chatter around here, let's reintroduce the Top 5 list. Lots have changed in the last decade: stars have come and gone, people (including us) have aged both gracefully and not so gracefully, and tastes have changed. If I can recall my first Top 5 list correctly, it went something like this: Elizabeth Shue, Elizabeth Hurley, Heidi Klum, Alyssa Milano, and Charlize Theron. I wonder how many will still make the cut?

Joker's Top 5 (in no particular order)

5) Alyssa Milano - C'mon, she was killer during her guest spot on "My Name is Earl" last season and she has her own line of MLB apparel for women. Just look at her in that Cubs hat!

4) Shakira – It's simple – Hips Don't Lie. She would break me and I would like it. Lots. And even E thinks she's hot. That's a winner!

3) Scarlet Johansson – I am rocking the cradle of love her, but she is the whole package. Except for the new album. Tom Waits writes good material, but I don't think she pulls it off. And will someone please get her away from Woody Allen movies!!!

2) Eva Mendes – She has horrible choices in movie roles (Hitch excepted) but I still love her.

1) Charlize Theron – She made the list a decade ago and she still looks almost as young now as she did then. No explanation needed.

To close things out, let me offer up the closing scene from that great episode of "Friends". I dare you tell me that, if you could even work up the nerve to talk to someone on your Top 5 list, that it wouldn't go just as bad as this. Heck, maybe even worse. Isabella didn't have a bodyguard to worry about.

Now let's hear what you have to say. Please post your own Top 5 list in the comments section. And remember to leave your name if so inclined.

Top 5: Rounding the Bases!

Well, it's late spring, the days are getting hotter, people are showing more skin, and there's baseball everywhere you turn. Heck, our beloved Cubbies are sitting on the best record in baseball right now! Clearly, there's something in the air.

So why not...the return of the Top 5 list? And why not combine two great summertime activities--baseball and making out?

Okay, here's how it works (thanks to Joker for the idea way back when): I'll list five songs, ranked according to the classic "baseball as sexual metaphor" round-the-bases scale, with the fifth spot reserved for an absolute strikeout song. Feel free to suggest your own listings in the comments. Here we go:

First Base: Edwin McCain, "One Thing Left to Do" This little gem, from McCain's 2001 album Far From Over, is a jazzy little tale about picking up a woman in a bar, then doing the flirtatious dance to get her home with you for the night. The slinky guitar is a come-on, the saxophone a seduction, and McCain trades his signature shouts for a late-night, beer-soaked growl as he tries to convince the girl he's not just after one thing (though he clearly totally is). The song will stall out at first base for most listeners, though, as they start to laugh at his late-song suggestions for the "one thing left to do:" pay the bar tab, grab some Waffle House, "call up one of your girlfriends, and...wait, wait, I was just kiddin'!" Still, it's a heck of an icebreaker.

Second Base: U2, "Love Comes Tumbling" Sure, "With or Without You" is the safer choice, and has probably resulted in a lot more babies being born (quite possibly the majority of 20-year-olds in this country today were conceived to this song, in fact), but this lesser-known track, an Unforgettable Fire outtake repurposed on the Wide Awake in America EP, has a sort of sultry, late-night-rolling-around-in-bed quality to it that I've always liked. It's maybe a little too eighties, and doesn't really sound like U2 that much, but it's a nice bit of soundtrack to some light fooling around.

Third Base: Garbage, "Thirteen" The original version of this song, by Big Star (a band that radio listeners don't know, but that every other band loved), was a sweet little ode to schoolboy crushes, set against cutesy guitars and featuring lines about the Friday night dance and the local swimming pool. The song is so innocuous that it has been used on two sitcoms, as the soundtrack for Eric's and Donna's breakup on That 70's Show and Ted's cutesy two-minute date on How I Met Your Mother. But in the hands of Garbage, layered with synth effects and a looping bass beat, as sung by the smoky, hot-sex-on-a-platter voice of Shirley Manson, this is a song that will engender a stand-up triple any night of the week. I saw the band do this live before I'd ever heard the recorded version (released only as a B-side), and I'm pretty sure I tried to make out with myself in the middle of the concert.

All the Way Home: Maxwell, "Whenever Wherever Whatever" Put simply, if you're not both naked by the end of this song...well, it just ain't ever gonna happen.

The Strikeout: Snoop Doggy Dogg (featuring Nate Dogg, Kurupt, and Warren G), "Ain't No Fun (If the Homies Can't Have None)" This gem of a hip-hop song--in my opinion, the sheer acme of the West Coast sound--has it all: a danceable, grindable beat, a groovy funk guitar, the smooth R&B-tinged vocals of Nate Dogg, and three brief but clever rap verses by Snoop, Kurupt, and Warren G. You could probably make out to this...unless you're paying attention to the lyrics. This is also, quite possibly, the most misogynist song ever put to tape. I won't quote lyrics here (this is a family site, after all), but the gist is this: "I have enjoyed sexual relations with you in the past, madam, but I have grown bored and would like to move on. However, I do insist that you have sex with all of my friends, lest they get upset with me for not sharing your fine services with them, and I do expect you to service them with a smile on your face. Now, get to it." This--in the more graphic terms used by the artists--will probably send the woman you're with out the door fast enough to leave one of those little Roadrunner dust clouds behind. However...if you find a woman who hears the lyrics, is okay with them, and still sleeps with you, you should shower immediately, and call a physician posthaste.

Top Five Time!

Okay, kids...you knew it was coming eventually. Time to bring back the Top Five tradition. You know the drill: we pose a question, give our own list, and (hopefully) get your replies, in this case in the comments section.

I'll admit, I'm getting a head-start on this particular topic, because the question sprung from a conversation I had this weekend, and I've already been thinking about the list. The question is:

Name five "stalker" songs, and you can't use The Police's "Every Breath You Take."

Here are mine:

5. Snow Patrol, "Spitting Games" From Final Straw, the band's third album and major-label debut. Singer Gary Lightbody inhabits the character of a lovestruck schoolboy to utter the opening lines:

I broke into your house last night
And left a note at your bedside
I'm far too shy to speak to you at school
You leave me numb and I'm not sure why

On the one hand, I'm willing to give the song a pass, as the character is clearly immature...but on the other hand, he broke into her house! Not cool, little Gary.

4. U2, "Babyface" From the band's underrated Zooropa album. Bono sings of "coming home late at night, to turn you on." But it's not his wife, or a secret girlfriend. No, it's a woman on video, and judging by the way he tells us she's "tied up in lace," one can assume it's not a Disney video. The creepiest moment is when he tells us, "I've got slow motion on my side." I'm pretty sure he means he's glad he can drag out her screen presence exactly as long as he needs it for his purposes. That's kinda gross. Bono, are those tissues by your bedside sad tissues, or happy tissues?

3. Matthew Sweet, "Winona" From Girlfriend, the singer's 1991 breakthrough. This song takes Bono's home-video obsession to the next level, actually naming an actress and pursuing her via telephone. It's clearly no accident, the spelling he chose for the woman's name; it matches that of actress Winona Ryder, who was at the height of her Heathers popularity when the song was written. Sweet opens by admitting he called, but her line was busy; he heads into nosy territory by asking, "Were you talking to a friend?" But by the chorus, he's asking Winona to "be my little movie star" and admitting that "I don't really know you, but I'm alone in the world."

2. Garbage, "#1 Crush" From the Romeo + Juliet soundtrack. Shirley Manson tells you that she will lie for you, die for you, feel pain for you, beg and steal for you, do time for you...and she "will never be ignored." Those of us who've seen Fatal Attraction know what that means: She'll boil your bunny!

1. R.E.M., "Superman" You may know it from various commercials for cars and other consumer goods, but this song is unapologetically stalkerish. Mike Mills, taking over on vocals, tells the object of his affection:

I am Superman, and I know what's happening
I am Superman, and I can do anything
I know you don't love that guy you make it with, now do ya?
I know you don't love that guy, 'cause I can see right through ya.

And later:

If you go a million miles away, I'll track you down, yeah
Trust me when I say I know the pathway to your heart!

Well, Mike, I'm not Brainiac, but I sense a restraining order in your future.